Lessons from our lunar landing go far beyond science

livemint.com:

startups or resources for government projects or corporations, a mindset of thrift aids innovation. India’s lunar-landing success suggests that a frugal mindset is not at odds with high ambition. Learning from failure: The adage that “failure is a stepping stone to success" was in ample and direct display here.

The principal efforts and final differences between Chandrayaan 2 and 3 were in areas of prior failure, particularly the landing vehicle’s approach to the lunar surface. One of the major successes of America’s Apollo missions came because the US made learning from errors a central part of the process. For India’s government and private sector, just this lesson alone, properly applied, could pay rich dividends.

Preparedness and planning: For Indians, it seemed like an epiphany that a self-propelled vehicle, subject to many uncertainties, would land almost a minute early. Indian companies, state governments and the Union government would do well to adopt a ‘6:04pm’ approach to their projects. Record and learn from failure, plan, simulate, monitor and critique sub-projects.

Then deliver on time. Resourceful supply chain management: Examples abound of how Chandrayaan’s project managers used local sources to reduce costs and substitute difficult-to-come-by parts. For instance, anorthosite rock from Sithampoondi and Kunnamalai in Tamil Nadu’s Namakkal district, which resembles lunar soil used for landing tests, took the place of similar rocks earlier imported at great expense from the US.